Jury Duty

Ancient dolphin from the Etruscan museum in Rome

63 – March 4

“Reflect upon your present blessings, of which every man has many…not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.”—Charles Dickens

In Los Angeles, they recently changed the requirements for jury duty so that if called, you only had to serve for one day or one trial. As a single, self-employed person, I had always been excused from jury duty because it would cause a financial hardship. But this new system made it possible for me to participate. Rather than regarding it as an onerous duty, I rather looked forward to the new adventure. It made me think about our system of government and how lucky we are to have a judicial system in which judgments are rendered by a jury of our peers. Beats tyranny and oppression every time.

So my peers and I showed up at the Van Nuys courtroom, checked in and waited to be called.

There were about three hundred of us in a large, comfortable waiting room. Fifty at a time, they called our names, upon which we proceeded to a courtroom, where we were to be interviewed as prospective jurors.

In the courtroom, the panel involved a murder case, expected to last for eight days. The defendant was accused of murdering his estranged wife. One by one, the bailiff called the jurors to the jury box, where they were asked a set of questions. Many jurors were excused, based on their answers. They completed the jury before I was interviewed, and my jury service of one day was over. But the answers I had to the questions they asked struck me:

Have you ever been a victim of a crime? “Yes, my home has been burglarized three times; my car has been broken into three times, stolen once; I have been robbed at gun point once and physically attacked in my home in the middle of the night once.”

Have you or anyone you know ever been a victim of domestic violence? “Yes, I have.”

Have you ever abused alcohol? “Yes, I am a sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous.”

I had never added up all this information about my past in quite this way. And I saw how much of a victim I had been. I believe it’s because, at that time, I had a victim mentality; I thought negative, fearful thoughts and attracted those experiences to me. I noticed, too, that since I had actively practiced positive thinking, my experiences had also changed, and I was a victim no more.

Please note I am not blaming all victims here, just noting that if you are a victim over and over again, maybe it has something to do with you. Like the old Marvin Gaye/Kim Weston song says, “It takes two, babee-ee-ee.” So I determined to stop thinking like a victim, stop telling victim stories, and decided to focus on winning. Now I tell success stories. How about you?

Today’s Affirmation:
“I am victorious over my past and creating abundance today!”

Ancient dolphin from the Etruscan museum in Rome
Ancient dolphin from the Etruscan museum in Rome

Hallelujah, I am so glad not to be a victim Tuna any more! It’s so nice now just to feel safe, and happy, and prosperous. Ahhhh.

But I get little reminders from time to time, that I am not perfect at the positive thinking thing after all.

Once, we were having construction on our street for more than three months. The Department of Water and Power are replacing the water main. The street was filled with “no parking” signs and often got closed. Lots of trucks and drilling and noise.

One day, I was worried about loud drilling noise during my afternoon teleclass. I hoped they would show up on a different day, or at a different time. But somehow I kept picturing how awful it would be if they started drilling right outside my house during the class.

Bingo. Sure enough, the truck showed up to drill in front of my house at exactly 15 minutes before the class started and ended about 15 minutes after the class was over. Out of the 40 hour work week, they chose the 2 hours that I most needed them not to be here.

This is a perfect example of the Law of Attraction. I focused on what I didn’t want, and bam! I got what I didn’t want. As Abraham-Hicks noted:

“The Universe is responding to you in your NOW.  So whatever you’re feeling right NOW means that is what you are sending out vibrationally right NOW, which means that is what you are attracting to yourself right NOW, which means your future is FULL of a bunch of stuff that is gonna feel pretty much like right NOW feels.”

Remember to always focus on what you DO want instead!

I am humbled once again, remembering Catherine Aird’s admonition, “If you can’t be a good example, then you’ll just have to be a terrible warning.”

Today I’m focusing on happiness, clarity, and winning big at everything I do. What are you going to focus on today?

I had actively practiced positive thinking, my experiences had also changed, and I was a victim no more.

Prosperity is a habit. You have to practice it every day.

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Chellie

Chellie Campbell is a Financial Stress Reduction® Coach and the author of The Wealthy Spirit, Zero to Zillionaire, and From Worry to Wealthy. She is one of Marci Shimoff's “Happy 100” in her NYT bestseller Happy for No Reason and contributed stories to Jack Canfield’s books You’ve Got to Read This Book! and Life Lessons from Chicken Soup for the Soul. Past president of the LA Chapter NAWBO, she was "Most Inspirational Speaker" by Women in Management and "Speaker of the Year" by the Association of Women Entrepreneurs. She does daily inspirational videos in The Wealthy Spirit Group on Facebook.

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